The widespread adoption of glyphosate-resistant corn and soybean in cropping
rotations often results in volunteer plants from the previous season
becoming problem weeds that require alternative herbicides for control. Corn
yield losses due to season-long volunteer soybean competition at several
densities in two growing seasons were used to define a hyperbolic yield loss
function. The maximum corn yield loss observed at high volunteer soybean
densities was about 56%, whereas, the incremental yield loss
(I) at low densities was 3.2%. Corn yield loss at low
volunteer soybean densities was similar to losses reported for low densities
of velvetleaf and redroot pigweed, with 10% yield loss estimated to occur at
3 to 4 volunteer soybean plants m−2. Several herbicides,
including dicamba with or without diflufenzopyr applied at the V2 growth
stage of volunteer soybean, provided > 90% control, demonstrating several
economical options to control volunteer glyphosate-resistant soybean in
glyphosate-resistant corn. Reevaluation of control recommendations may be
needed with commercialization of other genetically modified
herbicide-resistant soybean varieties.